inspired by a quotation from Baháʼu'lláh - "Baha'u'llah talks about man as 'a mine rich in gems of inestimable value.' He says that 'education can, alone, cause it to reveal its treasures, and enable mankind to benefit therefrom'. In 1983 Gustavo Correa presented on the FUNDAEC project to Association for Baháʼí Studies 8th annual Conference. In 1985 an advisor of a development committee assisting the Anís Zunúzí Baháʼí School visited the FUNDAEC project in Cali to look for insights in development work. One of the authors was Farzam Arbab and president of FUNDAEC from 1974 to 1988, would also serve in several capacities for the religion including being a member of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baháʼís of Colombia, a Continental Counsellor, appointed to the International Teaching Centre and eventually elected to the Universal House of Justice in 1993. FUNDAEC has instituted a number of development projects: the Centro Universitario de Bienestar Rural, the "Tutorial Learning System" or "SAT" (the Spanish acronym for "Sistema de Aprendizaje Tutorial") and a micro-finance Project. The SAT was particularly successful with cutting the process of urbanization, increases in democratic behavior and aspects of gender equality, extra curricular activities in communities, stopping migratory movement of populations, and established public-private cooperation in Colombia. By 2002 the SAT system was in use in Honduras, Guatemala, Ecuador, Venezuela, Panama, Costa Rica, Brazil, Colombia and the first phases of the implementation of the program have started in Zambia. Parallel to SAT, FUNDAEC began a micro-finance initiative as well. Ruhi Institute In Colombia the Ruhi Institute, a Baháʼí study circle, began as an initiative of the community with a commitment starting in 1970. In 1980 a Ruhi Institute was operating in the border area where Ecuador and Colombia meet. About 1980 one of the Auxiliary Board members in Colombia entered into a process of consultation with several rural communities around the town of Puerto Tejada in order to help them identify steps. they could take to improve their own social conditions. An early aim was to establish nurseries and kindergartens. In 1983 it published its first course Principles and Beliefs, Course 1: Life and Death. The courses developed as a "Core Activities Initiative". In 1983 there was discussion of using the Ruhi Institute process in the Dominican Republic and in Puerto Rico. In 1984 Baháʼí Counsellors and Auxiliary Board members from Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Panama, Puerto Rico and